How can I tell if an old bottle of wine is still good?
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Dear Dr. Vinny,
I just opened a bottle of 2001 Sauternes that I’ve had for close to 15 years, and I can’t tell if it’s over the hill. The cork crumbled while I was opening the bottle. It has been in a wine cabinet that isn’t entirely dependable, so I do question the quality. I’m not familiar with dessert wines at all and wouldn’t know an outstanding one from a dud. I did detect some Sherry-like flavors, and it has some orange color. Can you help?
—Shelley, Townsend, Mass.
Dear Shelley,
Between the crumbly cork, the dark, orangey color and the Sherry-like flavors, I believe your wine is probably oxidized.
That means the wine has been exposed to too much oxygen. I’m guessing the cork dried out and let air in. When a wine is oxidized, the flavors become muted and stale, and nutty, Sherry-like notes appear. Think about what happens when you cut an apple and come back a while later. The fruit will start to turn brown and take on a nutty character. The apple isn’t bad—and wine that’s over the hill is safe to drink—but it’s probably less pleasant to enjoy.
It's a similar situation with wine that’s been exposed to air. Older wines topped with cork are more susceptible to oxidation, especially if they aren’t stored at the proper temperature and humidity and lying on their side, which helps prevent the cork from drying out.
While properly stored older wines can show some signs of oxidation—primary fruit flavors fade, and tertiary notes appear as complex chemical reactions occur inside the bottle very slowly over time—they should still have energy, charm and complexity. That should especially be the case with your bottle, since the 2001 vintage was a great year in Sauternes. If your wine was in good shape, it probably would have been stunning.
An oxidized wine, on the other hand, will seem tired and stale, much like how an open bottle of wine will start to lose some verve after it’s been open for a few days.
Oxygen and wine have a strange relationship. Some wines are made in an oxidative style, which means the wine is given plenty of exposure to oxygen during winemaking—think open-top fermenters and plenty of racking.
The opposite of this would be a reductive winemaking style, in which the wine is fermented in closed containers and inert gasses are used to preserve fresh, fruity notes. Wines of both styles can end up oxidized if they have a cork that doesn’t fit right, or if it dried out during storage.
All that said, I’ve seen plenty of crumbly corks that, to my surprise, did a great job preserving the wine inside the bottle. As it ages, Sauternes (and many other dessert wines) often takes on darker colors, including a range of orange and brown hues. Its flavor will also change, and some gentle, pleasant nutty notes wouldn’t be out of the question for a properly aged Sauternes. Aged wine also isn’t to everyone’s taste, and that’s OK. Finally, I find that bottle variation often becomes more apparent with aged wine—so your particular bottle may have just been a bit off.
—Dr. Vinny
